We caught up with Jonny Quirk of Beer Adventures to find out what’s happening in the exciting world of Beer Adventures, our beer mat sponsor for IMBC 17. Feast on this…

Hello Jonny! Can you tell us a little about what Beer Adventures is?

Beer Adventures is a brand new iOS and Android app which lets you take ‘app guided’ beer tours in loads of cities around the world. You can use one phone to get around town with a friend/partner or use multiple phones at the same time to compete with friends to be the best local beer expert on the day.

We spend loads of time curating tours all over the globe, researching the very best bars and brewtaps and aim to highlight places that are not the most obvious and easy to find. For instance you could use Beer Adventures in Singapore right now and be sipping some damn fine craft beer in a matter of minutes, before being lead to a number of great brewpubs and bars that are off the radar.

We’ve launched in 25 cities and will be adding new countries, cities and routes every week – including pairing beer with food, culture and sightseeing so that you get a genuine experience of the city you’re hanging out in. We design the tours to pass as many landmarks as possible so as you get to see the city too. You could be walking from bar to brewtap and may just pass by the Empire State Building or Rome Colosseum en route!

Our app also tests your beer and local city knowledge through pop-up questions, has great info on each venue you’re taken to so you know how it fits into the city and it’s history, plus we also offer a number of discounts and special offers in some of the bars we use.

Overall we’ve deliberately created something that is easy to use, is available whenever you need it and makes discovering and exploring a new city beer scene as fun as possible.

Why should people be interested in the Beer Adventures app?

The global beer industry is so exciting right now and like food, it’s the perfect thing to travel for. We’ve all been on organised walking tours that are expensive and take a big chunk out of your day, whereas our app pretty much provides you with the same service and you can use it whenever and wherever you want.

We’re something to be used close to home when wanting to take a day out somewhere new (for instance travelling from Manchester to Liverpool or Leeds for a day trip) or when travelling the world and needing to tap into the authentic beer scene wherever you are.

Once you’ve signed up to our app, you can choose any city in the world for free on us so as you can give it a spin and see what it’s like, then further cities cost less than the price of a decent pint. Once you own a city it’s yours, plus any new tours we create for that city will be yours for free then too.

We’re also running a special competition to the end of Indy Man weekend with everyone who downloads and signs up to our app (plus likes our Beer Adventures App Facebook page) given the chance to win a £100 voucher from our friends at Hoptimism so here’s hoping there’s some good signal at Victoria Baths this year! (Ed: There is. Telcom done boosted our wifi!)

Who will you be making a beeline for at IMBC 17?

After still riding the high of BeaverX I’ll be found no doubt with either a sour or stout in hand. If the truth be known I try not to go with too many expectations of ‘must-drinks’ to beer festivals anymore. I just really want to enjoy a bit of everything that’s new and discover something a bit different whilst catching up with friends. Saying that there is definitely a chance I’ll be seen near Lervig, Burning Sky, Dugges, Buxton and Cloudwater’s beer! I’m also looking forward to some of Nasi Lemak’s Malaysian street food, which should go pretty well with some darker ales.

What else have Beer Adventures got in the pipeline this year?

Well we have some really exciting city launches happening in October and November with Scandinavia and South America coming online, plus new behind the scenes partner tours with famous breweries in various cities across the UK and Europe.

We’re also going to be working with a lot of UK beer weeks next year to put on some special events so we’re hard at work planning these already.

Overall we want to live up to our name and not just create average, well known city routes for people. We’ll be putting in the deep research to build tours like our new ‘Epic NYC’ one where you hit 10 beer places in one day and need to whizz around the city however you want (plane, train, automobile???) – we’ll keep shining a light on the underground and offbeat places that beer fans need to get to!

Lastly, have you got any recommendations of where visitors to Manchester should head pre-IMBC and post-IMBC?

I’m a massive fan of casual places that require minimal effort to head to at the moment. So GRUB by Piccadilly is great as there’s awesome beer and food every weekend. Cloudwater Barrel store is also high on my go-to list and Bundobust and COMMON are always solid for beer and food.

If anyone has a bit of extra time when visiting the city (or takes a wrong turn out of Victoria Baths…) then I’d always recommend hitting the suburbs for a few. Heaton Chapel train station has Heaton Hops and Bottle within about 10 minutes walk of each other and they’re always a good choice with some of the best beers in Greater Manchester on-tap.

If you are looking for inspiration around Indy Man then we have 3 tours on the Manchester section of our Beer Adventures app all ready to go for free – there’s also an IMBC festival special tour that’ll take you to 6 great places in town so I welcome everyone to give it a spin and see what you think – you can download it HERE.

Thanks Jonny!

Check out Beer Adventures’ IMBC 17 tour on Facebook HERE and follow them via the following mediums…